With no disposition to interfere with the institution of slavery, Mr. Lincoln found himself chief magistrate of a great _nation_ in the midst of a great rebellion. And in his inaugural address on the 4th of March, 1861, he referred to the question of slavery again in a manner too clear to admit of misconception, affirming his previous views: "There is much controversy about the delivering up of fugitives from service or labor. The clause I now read is as plainly written in the Constitution as any other of its provisions: "'No person held to service or labor in one State under the laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in consequence of any law or regulation therein, be discharged from such service or labor, but shall be delivered up on claim of the party to whom such service or labor may be due.' "It is scarcely questioned that this provision was intended by those who made it for the reclaiming of what we call fugitive slaves; and the intention of the lawgiver is the law. "All members of Congress swear their support to the whole Constitution--to this provision as well as any other. To the proposition, then, that slaves whose cases come within the terms of this clause 'shall be delivered up,' their oaths are unanimous. Now, if they would make the effort in good temper, could they not, with nearly equal unanimity, frame and pass a law by means of which to keep good that unanimous oath? "There is some difference of opinion whether this clause should be enforced by National or by State authority; but surely that difference is not a very material one. If the slave is to be surrendered, it can be of but little consequence to him or to others by which authority it is done; and should any one, in any case, be content that this oath shall go unkept on a merely unsubstantial controversy as to how it shall be kept?" So the issues were joined in war. The South aggressively, offensively sought the extension and perpetuation of slavery. The North passively, defensively stood ready to protect her free territory, but not to interfere with slavery. And there was no day during the first two years of the war when the North would not have cheerfully granted the slave institution an indefinite lease of _legal_ existence upon the condition that the war should cease. FOOTNOTES: [72] National Intelligencer, Tuesday, May 7, 1861. [73] National Intelligencer, Tuesday, April, 2, 1861. [74] Barrett, pp. 177-180. CHAPTER XV. "A WHITE MAN'S WAR."